1. Field of the Invention
A dispenser assembly designed to dispense fertilizer or like dry material, by gravity flow, through selective manipulation of a control mechanism by the operator of the assembly.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the agricultural industry, it is, of course, well recognized that proper fertilization must occur in order to render the commercial growing of a given crop feasible. It is also well accepted that the dispensing of the fertilizer properly onto the given crop must be done accurately and in an effective manner to guarantee that the entire crop is properly fertilized.
In the growing of certain crops, particularly in the South American and Latin American countries, it is the practice to utilize a large labor force and through such use fertilize successively each of an extremely large number of plants individually. In accomplishing such fertilizer distribution, it has been found in the past that the fertilizer was normally sprayed onto the plant area after the fertilizer was mixed or blended with a predetermined amount of water. Problems in both time and expense were encountered due to the fact that large amounts of water, as well as the fertilizer itself, had to be transported to what may be considered generally remote areas where the crops were growing. In the aforementioned geographic locations, numerous agricultural areas involved transporting such supplies over mountainous areas. Individual members of the labor force, therefore, had to carry not only the fertilizer but were burdened with the weight of the water mixed with the fertilizer. Based on the above prior art and generally well-known techniques, an extremely large labor force was required and a relatively great amount of time was consumed in accomplishing fertilization. An additional problem associated with such prior art techniques was that the individual crops had to be fertilized more than one time during a growing season.
Based on the above, there is a recognized need in the agricultural industry for the fertilization of individual plants on an independent basis utilizing an assembly which will effectively eliminate the need for mixing the dry and normally particulate fertilizer material with water in order to accomplish an even dispersal of the fertilizer mixture onto the plant. Preferably, such a preferred dispenser assembly would automatically "measure" predetermined amounts of fertilizer in dry, particulate form and through operation of a relatively simple control mechanism dispense the predetermined amounts of premeasured fertilizer directly onto the plant area or other desired area of disbursement.